Self Promote and Succeed Audio Book Chapter 5

Chapter 5 Beyond the Business Platform Building Like a Pro Business cards can make people lazy. After several conferences where I was added to a dozen newsletters without opting in, it seemed to me that some people's platform building strategy was to just get email addresses. The real goal of building a platform is to build relationships, not build out a list. There are effective ways to do this and quick ways to be marked as spam. Focus on what's going to work best for your bigger picture goal, which is always quality and connection first. The power of the right Words Whether your goal is to use your book to establish yourself as an industry authority or to generate business leads, words can be powerful when it comes to achieving your end goal. When I launched the first online course for my real estate training and education company, I hired a junior copywriter to write the sales page. He charged $2,700. At the time, I was stunned that copy could cost so much, especially from someone fresh out of copywriting training. At American Writers and Artists Institute, a senior copywriter said he would charge me ten times that amount. What I didn't realize is that the right words count for everything when it comes to converting a visitor to a subscriber and a subscriber to a customer. There's an art and a science to writing copy that connects with readers in a way that motivates them to act. There are rules to writing copy that sells or copy that gets someone to take a desired action. AI systems are skilled at writing effective copy because it contains formulaic elements, but you still need to understand those elements to refine the language and ensure that you're building relationships with your readers and selling books. A great book engages the reader, but great marketing copy gets the reader to act. Read that again. Everything from your book description to your opt in page must be written to appeal to your reader by selling a benefit or generating enough interest or curiosity for them to take the next step. Take a look at your opt in copy. Does it read? Join my newsletter for updates or do you say download the game plan to sell 1,000 books by spending less than $100 with a note that readers who complete the download also receive bi weekly tips and tools. The difference is clear. Copywriting is a skill and a talent, and it takes time to develop. That said, AI really has made copywriting so much easier. If you haven't played around with AI tools like ChatGPT for help with copy, you're unnecessarily struggling through this. But even with AI, you need to understand some simple strategies to help you craft and improve copy that will build your platform. Focus on your reader with everything you write. Instead of saying my new book is out, grab your copy today. Say something like you are about to uncover the noboringbooks way to write a book that will have impact and make you income ready to start writing that great book today? Click here Perhaps you're thinking I'm telling a story about myself to create connection, so it has to be about me. That's true. You should share some of your personal beliefs, experiences and stories. You can still do it in a way that brings your reader into your story. An opener with a sense of mystery or intrigue can work well too. Here's an example. Have you ever met someone who was the center of a murder investigation before they were even born? Compare that to I was the center of an investigation of murder before I was even born. The first example is more intriguing because it draws the reader in. That's not my story, by the way. It's the incredible story of Nelson Tressler, who wrote Unlucky Sperm Club. Ultimately, the more you present copy with a focus on readers, the more engaging it is to them. Create a single call to action when you have a single call to action, it simplifies expectations and makes it easier for someone to do whatever you've asked. Think about the end of a podcast interview when the interviewer says, where can our listeners connect with you? Many authors reply with their website, all their social media handles, and where their book can be purchased. That's generally too much for one reader to absorb. Be specific. Go to book launchers.com gameplan and you can download our guide to sell 1000 books without paying for any ads. That will get you my email and all the links to connect with me too. Simple, clear, and it will achieve the goal of building your platform. You'll sell your books to the people who subscribe to your newsletter and listen to your interview much more efficiently and quickly than if you had given them a hundred places to find you. In general, you have to tell people what to do, whether it's in emails or on social media. A single call to action makes it simpler for the person on your website or reading your newsletter to know what action they're supposed to take. You want to give them a direct path to your door, not a convoluted map with dozens of possible routes. Note Some authors live in fear of being seen as selling anything. But the only thing worse than too many calls to action is none at all. Your platform won't grow with luck, books rarely sell without effort. Your momentum grows with intention. The job of writing copy is to get your reader to take some sort of action, and that action should align with your bigger picture. Goal for your book. If you want speaking engagements, tell the podcast interviewer Focus on the purpose of your book marketing and you'll find it begins to work out over time. Draw attention with the first line of a post, the title of your video, your email, subject lines, and article headlines. Try to create curiosity or offer a benefit. What does your ideal reader get from consuming this content? Sell them on consuming the content. Open loops that you'll close in the future. Your favorite show does this all the time with cliffhangers. They have a giant car crash just before the episode ends, or your favorite character gets shot and you don't know what has happened to them until a full episode later. Hook your reader in with a similar strategy by teasing future content or tools that won't arrive until your next post or email. If you tease your readers with messages like, that's a pretty cool strategy, but I've got an even better one for you tomorrow. You can make someone eager to hear from you again. Or you could say, P.S. watch for my next email in five days because I've got a checklist for you to get massive results using what you just learned. This checklist increases your success rate by 35%, so you'll want to keep an eye out for it. Writing great copy takes practice, and it definitely takes intention, but if you remember these five tips, you'll have more success Building an author platform for an audience that's going to pay attention to what you have to say. Newsletter or Audience Swaps Sometimes you just need a little help from your friends to get ahead in the publishing game. Swaps are a simple type of mutual marketing that can work for just about any bigger picture. Goal. Essentially, you're presenting an offer or great content with a call to action to someone else's audience, and then you reciprocate. If your goal is platform building, this is a great tactic to try. It can work for selling books if there is really good alignment between your friend's audience and your book's hook. It's also good for establishing your credibility, especially if your swap is with a known authority in the space. But it's best for platform growth. All this strategy takes is a newsletter or some other platform like a podcast or a YouTube channel, and a willingness to promote other authors in exchange for their promoting you. To put it simply, you pair up with another author and agree to include some content and a link to whatever you want to promote in their next newsletter. Depending on the goals for the swap, you you should each include the book's cover image along with blurbs and ideally a mini author bio. You should also include a really clear call to action so that readers can learn more about you and your book. Newsletter swaps are most effective if you have at least a few hundred subscribers. The more subscribers you have, the more swapping opportunities are available to you. But having a small subscriber base shouldn't scare you away from engaging with other authors to initiate a swap. Swaps are free, so so you're not risking anything. The worst thing you might experience is a little rejection, which might sting, but you'll go on. The hardest part might be finding people with whom to swap. If you already have an author network, start by asking those with similar books if they would be interested. Getting involved in your industry events can also help. Fincon has an author table where authors can sell their books. Many of those authors have similar audiences that could lead to effective swaps. At the Entrepreneur's organization, we have a MY EO Author and Speakers group where authors can connect to create mutually beneficial offers and opportunities like swaps. Going to networking events like 20 books to 50k is a great place to meet other authors. Another place to find newsletter friends is social media, especially on professional groups like LinkedIn or Facebook. You can even check out Goodreads or Reddit to see if any like minded authors would like to swap. Of course, it's key that the authors you choose for a swap have something of value or interest to your audience and vice versa. If you're writing for parents and you're swapping with a business author, you won't get the results you want. And neither will they. Even with newsletter swaps, you want to offer value by providing a benefit or solution to a problem. Line up with authors who share your target reader. It's collaboration, not competition. You can also turn to sites made specifically for this type of networking like StoryOrigin and BookFunnel. They do the hard work when it comes to connecting you with the right author for your swap. StoryOrigin offers a ton of useful features for an author looking to up their newsletter game, and it allows you to connect with other authors to swap mentions in upcoming newsletters and group promos. This is where you can team up with multiple authors to promote your books on a single landing page. BookFunnel is similar to StoryOrigin. It provides a toolbox of custom landing pages, ebook and audiobook delivery, and direct email integration the difference is that BookFunnel is a paid subscription plan, but even their most basic plan gets you one to one author swap organization assistance, along with group promos and a ton of other pretty sweet features. Once you find an author for a swap, simply exchange the information you both need, including a link image and reader magnet. When sending links to authors to promote your work in their newsletters, put consideration into what exactly you want to share. Be sure to include a brief blurb about your book and a short author bio too. If you have accolades like awards, be sure to include those. Or if you have a positive editorial review or an endorsement, you can highlight a line or two. Most important, before you send your materials to your newfound swap friend, check to make sure your links work. You have one chance to make an impression on subscribers. Make it count. You also want to make it as easy as possible for someone to promote you. Plan the timing of your newsletter swap and make sure you include everything you've agreed upon and and of course, I think this goes without saying, but let's say it anyway, just in case. Follow through on your side of the swap with enthusiasm and goodwill. Finally, don't get disheartened if you gain and lose some subscribers while participating in a swap. Sometimes readers may not enjoy your work. You won't please everyone. Continue networking and building that platform. Consistency, creativity, and continually trying new strategies work in the long run for platform building. Ten years from now, people will see your gigantic audience and ask you for the magic bullet to build a platform like yours. Content Marketing Building your platform is a long game. It's all about staying in the market and consistently doing things to find your audience. Day after day. You'll have days when it feels as if nobody is listening. Worse, sometimes you'll get a troll who says something nasty. You'll feel like quitting. Keep going. Trolls are just a sign that your content is reaching people who aren't already supporting you. If you're reading this and wondering what content marketing is, here's a quick explanation. It's any content of value you create that has a long life. This can be images, text, video, in person content or audio content. Every nonfiction author should do some form of content marketing because it build a loyal audience, drive traffic organically, establish credibility, foster business growth, generate book sales, lead to speaking engagements and PR opportunities, and reduce advertising costs. If you're starting completely from scratch, my suggestion would be to tap into places that have an existing audience as opposed to starting a blog on your website and having to drive traffic to that blog. Websites like Medium, Forbes, Cosmopolitan, Reader's Digest, and the Huffington Post, among others, are major sites that accept article submissions. A few even pay a small fee if you are selected. Building your newsletter and content marketing are constantly evolving responsibilities. So rather than give you a giant to do list, my suggestion is to pick one task that appeals to you, even a little. Imagine someone said that you can create only one type of content for a year. What would that be for you? For me, it's video. Imani Roberts, author of DJs Mean Business, has found a great platform on Twitch and live streaming video. Nick Kennedy, author of the Good Entrepreneur, reluctantly entered the TikTok realm and has grown a nice following there. And Peter Carianas, author of Corporate Counsel, does a Wonderful job on LinkedIn with engagement and content. There's no pressure to be everywhere doing everything. Just do something. Meanwhile, remember, with every piece of content you create, make sure you have a call to action that ideally sends people back to your reader magnetic to opt in. The number one priority of content marketing is to build your audience so that you have people who are excited to read your book, post reviews, hire you, buy your course and share your message. If you're getting the feeling that content marketing is work, it is. There are no magical book marketing solutions. AI offers opportunities for speeding up content creation if you're willing to learn how to use it. Personally, I'm loving the ability to use a service like content Fries or video AI to take long form video content like a live stream and turn it into all kinds of bite sized content for shorts, reels and more short form content. That space and the tools in it are evolving so fast I'm not even going to get into this. Just know that content creation is getting easier and less costly every day. You can also hire help with different aspects of content marketing, but one action will rarely lead to thousands of sales. Sometimes you create something that really connects with people and spreads, but results most often arise from consistent effort over time. That's why you should pick at least one form you enjoy and stick with it. LinkedIn the professional person's Social Media Platform Many nonfiction authors have built a really Strong following on LinkedIn and it can be the perfect place to find your audience if you're in the business or professional space. Notice that I did not say LinkedIn is the ultimate bookselling platform. If you want that, maximize your Amazon sales page and run Amazon ads more to come that. However, LinkedIn is a great place to be discovered as an expert and to connect with your potential readers. If you've decided Your book should serve as a calling card for your expertise. LinkedIn could be one of the most promising platforms for you to use. The best part of LinkedIn is small adjustments can yield big results. Before you do anything else, make sure you've recently updated your profile or create one if you don't have it. I generally recommend you use your legal name, but if your name is taken, you can go with your author branding. I don't recommend you use your book title because you and your brand are much more than one book. Your banner is a good place to invite people to join your email list with your fabulous lead magnet or advertise your book in a way that showcases the benefit to your ideal reader. When you create your banner, pay special attention to where the circular author photo goes. You don't want it to hide any text. Next up, let's update your LinkedIn headline and this should be short and clear and focused on your ideal audience and what you offer them. Using keywords really helps too, because you will be found in searches on LinkedIn when someone looks for an expert in a specific space. The optimization of your profile is all about what's going to generate more profile views, in addition to creating content that gets engagement from other LinkedIn users. Remember, your profile might be about you, but it's not for you. Complete the about section to clearly explain who you are, how you can help, and whom you can help. You want someone interested in your product, services, expertise or book to get all that in a few short sentences. It's also useful to use this section to tell someone how you want them to contact you by email, website, telephone or snail mail. Although most LinkedIn users are likely to message you right there on the platform. Now comes the best part for any author adding your featured items. Here's where you can highlight big media features, important things you've written or awards you've won, and of course, your book. You can add as many links as you want, including an Amazon link to buy your book, but only two are shown on your front page. Users need to scroll to the right to see any other links. Take time to figure out exactly what you want your ideal connections to see. Once your profile is up and looks good, there are a lot of fabulous ways to use LinkedIn. Remember, this is professional networking, so leave pictures of your kids off this platform unless there's a very clear connection to your work or messaging. My friend Devin Karpes runs a successful international digital ad agency and is founder of Too Cool, a group focused on promoting the benefits of cold, plunging and Cold Showers, Devin featured a story about his daughter. His post was all about how she learned the value of entrepreneurship. When she earned $100 in a few hours at her lemonade stand, she realized it was going to take her 10 weeks to earn the same amount with her weekly allowance. That's the kind of post about your kids that's appropriate for LinkedIn. You can post book related content such as advice or images from your book, or try infographics, social media posts or shares that highlight a quote. You can share interviews and media that featured you and highlight quotes or advice you shared in those features. This is not about promotion, it's about adding value. You can also create a LinkedIn newsletter or write articles on the platform. This can be easier to gain traction than if you only post content to your own website because many People are on LinkedIn searching for content, commenting and sharing cool ideas or interesting information. For example, Phil McKinney, a retired Hewlett Packard executive, author and podcast host, has written and maintains a popular LinkedIn newsletter. Finding ideas. That's a great way to build your position as a thought leader. Create content that is easy for people to share and as a result grow your audience and stay in front of them. You can also create video content on the platform. Linking to other video platforms doesn't work as well as posting natively to their platform because they don't want people to leave their platform. Often external video links will be suppressed in the feeds. Now it's time to start looking for connections. Who shares your target audience? Check them out, reach out and connect. Maybe there's a way you can help each other find relevant LinkedIn groups and start adding value to the conversations there. People will see your comments and check out your profile. Please don't post promotional content in these groups. Add value. People want to connect with you only when you've added value to a conversation, and there's a lot More opportunity on LinkedIn if you decide to use it, but this will get you started celebrity status with YouTube I wonder how many people know we have a celebrity here, said a man who smiled as he walked up to my booth at a National Speakers Association NSA conference. We have Julie the Book Broad in the house. It turns out that he watched a bunch of my videos while he wrote his book and that led him to buy my book, which helped him even more. He came over to say thank you. It was a cool moment and it happens more and more often, which is really rewarding. It's also further evidence that YouTube is a powerful platform to for being discovered and connecting with potential book readers, clients, influencers and more. Even if the idea of being on camera freaks you out a bit, the reality is the world is only moving more and more toward video. Plus, YouTube is owned by Google, so being prominent on the video platform gets you to the top of Google searches. It's also a place where people go to solve problems. People are searching on YouTube for the problem you can solve. If you're not there, they won't find you. Plus, YouTube is totally fine with you selling your book and getting people to opt into your newsletter or even buy your product and service. On top of that, when you get 1,000 subscribers, you can enable monetization so every view makes you a little money. You can also promote other people's stuff with affiliate links, which can be pretty lucrative if you have a message to market match. Finally, you can get sponsorships and connect with potential clients for your business, podcast or blog tip. If you are an introvert like me, video helps folks recognize you in real life, and being recognizable makes life as an introvert easier. You don't have to work so hard to meet people. They will come to you at conferences and networking events because they feel as if they know you already. You're welcome. Now, I'm not going to give you a technical, step by step guide on how to start a YouTube channel because there are plenty of fabulous resources online to help with that. But let's talk strategy. How to get started with your YouTube channel when your book goes to the editor, it's a great time to get your author, website, newsletter and YouTube channel all set up and ready to go. Even if your book is already out, it's not too late. It's never too late to start, but the sooner you do it, the better. Here are a few quick tips specific to authors. Title your channel something broader than your book. Name it after your business or your name so you can build a community and use it to promote whatever you do. Beyond the book. Kathyloves Physics is a great example. While Kathy Joseph wrote her book, she also created her YouTube channel and built it big too. Go Kathy. Her first book was the Lightning True Stories of the Dreamers and Schemers who Harnessed Electricity and Transformed Our World. On her channel, she has a series specific to this book, and when she moves her attention to her new book, she creates a series specific to that one. Her channel has a big enough umbrella to cover many books. Use your book for content. When you feel stuck trying to plan your content, remember your book. Longtime viewers of Book Launchers TV have certainly picked up on the fact that much of this book started as video content, but the reverse works well too. Turn different sections of your book into short videos up to 12 minutes long. You can also use a subject from your book as a live stream discussion topic. Potential content derived from your book could become a video about the single most important tip to get top results or five things you don't know about Insert your subject but should. Or maybe you can try something like three myths about Insert your subject. Numbered videos tend to perform really well for a lot of content creators, including book launchers. TV don't hold back trying to sell your book. You can realistically give one strategy or idea in depth or handful of quick tips in one video. Let's say in your book you have a list of 10 things to say to a woman so she feels beautiful. Share the most surprising three things from that list and then add this to the video. Want to know the other seven? They're in my book. Pick up a copy right here. Heck, you could even create one video for each tip and still have people who buy your book because they want it in that format. Let's say your book has 18 chapters. You can easily shoot 20 videos and not even give away half of its good content. People will still buy your book even if they're already familiar with a lot of your content. Besides, even your biggest fan probably doesn't watch every single one of your videos. I mean, I think Sean Hayes and Efren Delgado, two of my YouTube besties, are getting close to watching all my videos, but I bet they are also reading this book right now. Most people will probably watch only a handful of your videos or read only some of your content, but if they love it, they just might buy your book or even check out your website to see if you have a product or service that will help them even more than your video or book. Or remember the overall goal of your book marketing. Was it to sell books? Okay, then your call to action in every video should be to buy your book. If your overall goal was to create speaking opportunities, giving all your book content away on your channel makes complete sense. Because the goal isn't an $18 book sale, it's an $18,000 speaking gig. Whenever you really question whether you should put your best tip out there, look at the movies and what they put in previews. If they didn't put some of the best scenes in that movie trailer, you might never go see the movie. They know they have to show you some of the best stuff to get you in the door worry more about what's going to interest people the most, then consider what might be too much to give away. Some authors worry that if they put their best stuff in the book, people won't buy their course. Here's an example from my life Pitch Anything by Oren Klaff was one of my favorite books when I raised capital for my real estate investments. When he came out with an online course, I happily bought it. Even though the course consisted largely of the content from his book, I didn't mind because it was a different format. It also expanded on some of the topics in the book just enough, and it included worksheets and tools. I was a huge fan and I wanted to learn every single nugget of information he had to give, so it was worth it to me. If he'd come to my city or city near me with an in person event at the time, I would have paid for that too. Bottom line, if you have great content, your fans are going to want to consume it. So show them how awesome you are and don't hold back. Believe that you have enough greatness and amazing content to go around and make them want more. Now that you know that you need to start churning out video content and why it's important to post it consistently, let's turn our attention in the next chapter to getting out there through speaking engagements the Mindset for Platform Building Like a Boss Imagine you're a singer. Your popularity is growing. You're not really famous yet, but people are starting to recognize you. You're scheduled to perform a free concert for about 500 people. You've traveled quite a distance for this concert and you are excited to have such a great audience. A few hours before the show, as you're setting up, a massive snowstorm rolls through. The snow piles up so fast that most people can't get out of their houses, let alone drive anywhere. Instead of 500 people, there are 10 people in the audience. Your opening act goes on stage but puts on a half hearted performance. They probably feel as if it's a waste to expend a lot of energy playing for free for just a few people. What do you do? It would be so easy to think, forget it. Why go on? What's the point of playing for 10 people? That's not what happened though. This is actually a true story. The performer stepped on stage and said to the audience, well, I'm disappointed that there's so few of you here, but I want to thank you for being here. I have a new song I want to play for you. I hope you like it. He proceeded to belt out what's New Pussycat? As if he had a full stadium. That singer was Tom Jones. I heard that story more than a decade ago when I interviewed Jim Randall, author of Confessions of a Real Estate Entrepreneur. Jim was in that audience of 10 I think about it all the time, especially when new authors get hung up on the fact that they only have 100 people reading their newslet or 20 people at their book launch. The truth is, it doesn't matter if there is one person or hundreds of thousands of people reading what you write or hearing what you have to say. It's a privilege to have an audience at all. Everyone, even Tom Jones and Tony Robbins, started small and worked their way up. That's a big part of thinking your way to success. It's not about you, it's about your audience or your client. It's the challenge and fun of being an author and working on the long game of getting paid for your expertise. It would be nice if you launched a book and made money the next day, but it rarely works that way unless you've spent a decade building your audience before your book comes out. What if you're an introvert and the idea of building an audience and networking to develop connections freaks you out? My friend, the next chapter is written especially for you. Chapter Summary 1. Become a Better copywriter. Remember to focus on your reader and include one call to action per email. Write a compelling subject line so your email gets opened. Also, open loops in that email that you'll close in the next email to encourage readers to keep looking forward to forthcoming communications. 2. Swap audiences with other authors to achieve your goals. 3. Create compelling content focused on the reader and what they need to learn for you to generate new subscribers, increase book sales and enhance your authority. 4. You don't need to be everywhere doing everything. Just be somewhere consistently. 5. It's a privilege to have an audience, no matter the size. 6. YouTube is a great platform owned by Google to leverage the content of your book into video for an audience that knows, likes and trusts you and thinks of you as a celebrity in your niche.